


the back hand of god

by meritmut



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - Penny Dreadful Fusion, Demons, F/M, Possession
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-09
Updated: 2018-10-09
Packaged: 2019-07-28 08:33:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,166
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16237958
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/meritmut/pseuds/meritmut
Summary: “He doesn’t know what it is, to have—that thing, inside you,” her voice is quieter than he’s ever heard it. “To feel it, clawing like it wants to get out.”





	the back hand of god

**Author's Note:**

  * For [diasterisms](https://archiveofourown.org/users/diasterisms/gifts).



> [kazoo noises] many happy returns me love <3 <3 <3

**

 

They’ve left him alone up there, locked in his room in the attic. It doesn’t sit right with her, but then—no one’s asking her for her opinion, are they? She’s little more than the help, the hired gun, keeping to the shadows under the stairs while the others decide his fate.

It’s for the best, she decides. What does she know of the devils who haunt the darkness?

Her monsters have always lived in the light.

 _Would you want to be alone?_ A thread of doubt creeps in: try as she might, she cannot keep from thinking of him. _Or would you be scratching at the walls too, howling into the air just to hear something?_

It’s been hours since she last heard him cry out.

 

**

 

His ears prick up when she slips into the room. He rolls his head towards her, blinks sleepy eyes as her shape solidifies out of the gloom.

 _Rey_ slips from his mouth like liquor, honey-sweet and slightly scandalous on his tongue. It's not proper: she hasn't even invited him to call her _Aurélie_ yet, but he'd heard the nickname from Finn and hadn't been able to get it out of his head since and—seeing as he's borderline delirious at present—Ben hopes he can be forgiven for a little impropriety. He'll beg her pardon later if he gets the chance.

“Mr. Solo,” she says cautiously. “You’re awake.”

 _Are you?_ The unspoken question. _Is it you?_

“How long?” His voice comes out hoarse. “How long have I been asleep?”

She glances away, then back. Guilty. “This time?”

It is an answer of its own kind, but it is not enough and she knows it.

“It’s been a week,” she admits eventually.

_Oh._

“You wake up sometimes,” Rey continues, perhaps noting the way his face falls. “That’s been fun.”

Ben winces. “I’m sure.”

“Our mutual friend the doctor thought we might have to restrain you.” She’s at his side, now, sliding into the chair left by the bed and folding her sun-browned hands in her lap. “To keep you from hurting yourself.”

_Himself?_

“Probably wise.”

Her eyes flick up to his. “He doesn’t know, though, does he?”

Ben stares at her. Something has shifted in the air; something barely perceptible, the faintest shadow crossing her face and settling in her dark eyes. She’s looking at him so directly now, it unsettles him when she would always shy from meeting his gaze before.

 _Are you afraid of me,_ he’d asked—or wanted to, to see if it made her bold, but now someone else is clawing at the inside of his head and she looks at him without fear and—no, it was never him she was afraid of, was it?

Something else, then.

“He doesn’t know what it is, to have—that thing, inside you,” her voice is quieter than he’s ever heard it. “To feel it, clawing like it wants to get out.”

Ben stares at her, the desire to hear more warring with the thirst tearing at his throat.

The thirst wins. “Is there water?”

Rey gets to her feet so she can fetch the jug—placed out of his reach so he can’t launch it at someone, he assumes, but seeing it just beyond his grasp feels more like a form of torture. She hands him the cup wordlessly and takes her seat once more.

“Can I get you anything else?” she asks, once he has taken a few sips. The intensity of the previous moment is gone: her gaze has settled safely just above his head again. “Something to read, or to eat? Someone to talk to? Maybe a priest, if it would help...” she grimaces. “I wouldn’t know, really, I’ve…rather fallen from the faith.”

Ben wants music. He wants conversation, small talk—just, _sound_ to fill the silence. He longs for someone to read to him but he cannot find the courage to ask her.

“Not tonight,” he says.

“Alright.”

For a moment he watches her, memorising the nervous little movements of her fingers in her lap. Weaving and interlacing, like the old rhyme— _here’s the church, here’s the steeple_ —an invisible cat’s cradle looping its way into his chest and his ribs and _—open it up—_ pulling the words out him before he can snatch them back.

“I don’t…remember,” he starts, clears his throat and tries again, “everything that happens. When…”

Rey waits for him to find the words, a faint line appearing between her brows.

“Some things I do,” he hastens to add, because it sounds too much like he’s trying to distance himself from the things he’s said and done and even though he wants nothing more than to do that, than to let himself believe this wasn’t _him,_ he doesn’t like the look on her face when he does. For want of anything else to say, he blurts, “you’ve been kind.”

Rey smiles a little bemusedly. “Not really.”

He pushes himself further upright in bed so he can sit at eye level with her. “Yes. You were. I remember. Rey—”

“Yes?”

“Don’t…don’t let me hurt someone.” He holds her gaze, her lovely golden eyes that smoulder on the edge of blazing, and implores her to understand.

She _must_ understand. She is the only one who can.

At length, with visible reservations, Rey nods. “I won’t.”

“They aren’t—they wouldn’t do it. They couldn’t. But you—” _you have the courage,_ he almost says, even though he has known this woman for less than a fortnight he could never ask this of anyone else; _you have the grace,_ and besides; there’s something about her that makes Ben feel as though he’s known her all his life. “If it comes to it.” _When it comes to it._ “You need to do it. Don’t hesitate.”

Her face has gone white. “And if I do?” she whispers. “If I hesitate?”

“You mustn’t—”

“Why?” She’s leaning forward now, fingers digging into the side of the bed. “What do you imagine waits for you, on the other side?”

Whatever she is, she is not the Rey of a moment ago. The darkness has come over her face again and in the place of the Rey he has known for such a short time, the quiet, intense young woman with the burning rage beneath the surface, something else has taken hold.

“Do you believe in Heaven, Mr. Solo?” She rises smoothly again and moves to seat herself on the edge of the mattress, her weight dipping the bed just slightly. She is not a heavy woman but there is more muscle to her than meets the eye—more of a great many things, Ben suspects. “What about Hell?” The corner of her mouth twitches in what might, generously, be termed a smile, but there’s no warmth or humour there. “I admit I know a little more of the latter. After all—” Her fingertips press into his wrist, the blunt edges of her nails digging in as the sclerae of her eyes turn black.

“Your God made sure I knew it very well.”

 

**

 

“I don’t like this,” mutters Rose.

“You don’t like anything.” There’s no real sting in Finn’s voice. He leans into her, pressing his shoulder against hers to soften the jibe.

Rose glowers down at her feet, dragging one foot over the carpet. “We shouldn’t just—leave him up there on his own. What if something happens?”

“What could happen?” Finn glances up at the ceiling. “He’s unconscious.”

“What if he wakes up?” Her scowl turns to something softer; something a little more worried. “I’m just saying. I wouldn’t want to be alone.”

Finn slips his hand into hers and gives it a squeeze. “He’s not alone,” he says gently. “We’re here. And Rey.”

At that Rose turns to look over her shoulder, searching for the taciturn woman Lady Leia had brought home just over a week ago, but Rey is nowhere to be found.

“Where is she?”

 

**

 

“Do you know me now, Ben?”

With one hand she pushes the sweat-matted hair back from his face, resting her palm against his cheek in a manner that is almost tender. Her eyes are cold as the grave, a cruel smile twisting her mouth. Ben’s blood runs cold in his veins.

“Who are you?” he breathes.

The thing that is not Rey grins. “Don’t you remember me?” She tilts her head to one side, a parody of innocent curiosity. “Have you forgotten my name already?”

Ben hasn’t forgotten; he could never forget, and the horror that grips him now is familiar in the worst way.

He was naïve to think he could escape it.

He is trapped, pinned by the malevolence in her gaze, but the mockery there puts some fire back in his belly.

“I have forgotten more than that,” he growls, made braver by spite. “You wear another’s face. Why should I remember what you hide? You’re nothing, and I have forgotten you.”

Her eyes flash dangerously, but he’s not done.

“Are you afraid?” he rasps. “Is that why you hide?”

“I think you could tell me some things about fear,” Rey says softly. “You have been afraid all your life, haven’t you?”

He says nothing.

“Do you know what I fear, Ben?”

“I honestly don’t care.”

“Wasted promise,” she continues as if he hasn’t spoken. “Destiny unfulfilled.”

His stomach turns to lead at the mention of _destiny_. “I should tell you you’re wasting your time, then. I will never surrender to you.”

“Then I will kill you. How would you prefer? My hands at your throat?” She licks her lips. “Shall I eat your heart?”

“I don’t care. Do what you will.”

The look on her face is almost rueful. “You can’t fight it forever, my Ben.”

 _No,_ he thinks. _But I can fight now._

She considers him, yellow eyes dancing. “I could kill them,” she says. “All of them, sitting there downstairs wondering what to do with you.”

 _Do it,_ he wants to snarl, if he thought her bluff was only that. _Do your worst. My soul stays mine._

“What do you want from me?” Ben demands instead. “Cease your games and tell me.”

_No more masks. No more lies. Get out of her skin and show me what you really are._

“I want _you,”_ she snaps. “I want you, by my side where you belong. Hell needs a king, Ben, and there is no one more worthy than you. Imagine it—you and I, together, ruling over the forces of the dark. It is your destiny.” She’s leaning forward now, like she could draw him into the world she conjures with her words and her nearness and her… _everything,_ because this creature is not Rey but he has no idea how to face a foe that wears her face. “We could change the world—or scourge it clean and start afresh. There would be no more fear, in that world. No more pain…no more dreams. The nightmares would end at last. Don’t you want that?” She’s so _close_ , her breath warm against his cheek and he thinks for a moment she will open her jaws and swallow him whole and there’s a part of him that hungers for it with a desperation that terrifies him.

“No more false gods, because we will have devoured them. Just thee and me, eternal. Everlasting. Together we will make this world new.”

And she presses her burning lips to his.

 

**

 

Rey hesitates on the stairs, her hand on the banister.

The house shifts around her in the way old houses do. Everything in this city is _old_. How anyone could ever sleep peacefully here, she doesn't know.

She thinks of the nightmares that have driven Ben Solo half to madness, of the way his mother paces the parlour downstairs though it’s long gone two o’clock.

No one is sleeping in this house.

It’s so quiet on the upper floors. Everyone else is down in the living rooms; Finn and Rose were murmuring in soft voices on the stairs when she left them and she hasn’t seen Luke in hours, but the very walls seem to watch as she dithers on the attic landing, debating with herself whether to open the bedroom door.

She can hear the steady breathing on the other side, the slow, restful cadence of his heartbeat. Maybe he is asleep after all.

He'd been so tired, last time she'd come up. He'd been white and trembling with exhaustion, the bruises under his eyes almost purple. He could barely keep his head up when she'd spoken to him but he looked so _terrified_ of sleeping, of being left alone with his nightmares once more.

She shouldn’t disturb him now.

Resolved, Rey turns to make her way back down the stairs, her lonely candle flickering as she moves and throwing dramatic shapes across the silk-panelled walls. The shadows close in behind her but Rey does not look back.

Morning is a long way off.


End file.
